Pneumatic action for automatic musical instruments



May 18 1926.

w. E. SPAETHE I PNEUMATIC ACTION FOR AUTOMATIC MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS FiledMay 22. 1924 cl a 2 E ZWW:

Patented May 18, 1926.

PATENT OFFICE.

WILHELM ERNST SIEAETHE, Q33 GEBA-REUSS, GERMANY.

PNEUMATIC ACTION FDR AUTOMATIC MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS.

, Application filed May 22, 1924.. Serial No. 715,117.

My invention relates to automatic musical instruments and moreespecially to the tune sheets and trackers used in connection with suchinstruments.

As a rule such time sheet is provided with circular note perforations orwith'slits extending in parallel to its longitudinal axis. Inconsequence of this arrangement such tune sheets must be made very long,sometimes more than 100 feet.

It is an object of my invention to reduce this inconvenient length andit will appear from the following description that in reducing thelength of the sheet I am also enabled to reduce its width for a givennumber of rows of perforations or to arrange a greater number ofjuxtaposed rows of perforations on a tune sheet of given width as washitherto possible.

the size of tune sheets.

It will first be necessary to define what is meant by the length andwidth of a perforation, as in my tune sheet the dimension that wouldusually be termed the width is the length and vice versa.

The length of a slit is therefore that dimension which extends inparallel to the edges of the sheet, and the width of a slit is thatdimension which extends transversely to said edges.

In a tune sheet having the usual circular perforations or slits made'upfrom a plurality of such perforations combined into a 35. single slit,obviously the length of a per-' foration is equal to its width and thelength of a slit is a. multiple of such length or In the usual tunesheets, therefore, the 40 length ofa slit is at least equal to its widthor it is a multiple of its width.

. In my tune sheet on the other hand, the,

length of a slit is only a fraction of its width.

Suppose a circular perforation of the usual type to have the diametercl, and suppose the length of the web between two adjacent perforationsto be 1. Then the length of a tune sheet between the endsof 0 twosuccessive perforations will be 2cZ+1.

Obviously a slit/0f rectangular shape will have the same effect as acircular perforation if it is of the same area. The width of such arectangular slit will be greater than 5 the diameter of thecorresponding circular It is an object of my invention toreduceperforation but its length will only be a fraction, say one-third,of its diameter, and so instead of 2d+1, the length of the sheet asdefined above will only be 0,6cZ-l-1.

It has already been proposed to form rectangular slits in atomic sheetthe length of whlch is a fraction of their width and in those tunesheetssuch slits were combined w th slits the length of which exceeds theirwidth, and so the length of the tune sheet could not be reduced. Nor isit an object of such arrangement to reduce the length of the sheet butits object is to provide a tune sheet for instruments having more than asingle key board. L

My novel tune sheet and the described arrangementyof its slits, besidesreducing the length of the sheet as described, involves two furtheradvantages:

The first advantage is that owing to the greater width of the slits ascompared with a circular perforation, lateral deflection of the slits ofthe sheet with regard to the slits of the tracker is not so detrimentalin my tune sheet as in tune sheets having circular perforations or slitsthe width of which is equal to the diameter of said perforations. Thediameter of a perforation is small, about in. as a rule, and if thesheet is deflected for substantially that amount, the note will not besounded. In my tune sheet, on the other hand, a deflection to thisamount will not interfereat all because the area of the tracker slitwhich the deviated slit in the tune sheet exposes, is still large enoughfor sounding the note and larger deviations will hardly ever occur.

The second advantage is that my novel tune sheet may be adapted forselectively controlling tracker openings in a single row. In

this case, the tracker is provided. with, say, three slits, one of whichis at right angles to the direction in which the tune sheet is moving,while the other two slits are arranged at either sideof this slit andoppositely inclined to said direction at an angle of, say, 45 degrees.Corresponding slits are made in the tune sheet. It will be understoodthat only those slits in the tune sheet and the tracker are able tocooperate properly which are at the same angle to said direction andthat, if an inclined slit meets the right-angle slit of the tracker, thearea exposed will be so small that a note will not be sounded.

Vith this selective arrangement it is possible to combine as many rowsof slots into single row, as there are various inclinations of slits andso the width of the sheet is much reduced. Its length will be increasedfor the difi'erence between the length of a rightangle slit and thewidth of an inclined slit projected on the edge of the tune sheet.

As shown in the drawings the circular perforations hitherto provided intune sheets are replaced by narrow substantially rectangular slits, eachslit correspmiding to one of the old circular perforations, but ha ringgreater width and inferior longitudinal e2:- tension. In contradisinction to the slits extending in the longitudinal direction of the oldtube sheets, such slits being as a rule formed of a number ofconsecutive circular longitudinal direction of the tune sheet.

perforations merging into one another, the slits according to thepresent invention extend at an angle to the longitudinal axis of thetune sheet and preferably at right angles thereto. For certain purposes,however, some of the slits may also be disposed at an acute angle to thelongitudinal axis of the tune sheets. In the drawings 1, l are transversely disposed. slits while 2 and 3 are slits disposed at angles ofabout 45 to the longi 'tudinal axis. The tracker '7 is provided withrows of transversely extending slits t and obliquely disposed slits 5and 6.

Obviously a tune sheet having rectangu lar slits disposed at an angle toits longitudinal axis, no matter whether it is brought into cooperationwith an ordinary tracker or with a tracker provided with slit-saccording to the present invention, offers great advantages as comparedwith the ordinary tune sheets. A. rectangular slit of the kindillustrated in the drawing while presenting the same or a greatersectional for the passage of air "than the circular note perforations isfar inferior in length in the It is therefore possible to arrange agreater number of these slits per inch of the length of the tune sheetthan with circular perforations and the total length of the tune sheetcan therefore be reduced materially or agreater number of perforationscan be ar ranged on tune sheets of given length without the quantity ofair sucked or pressed through the sheet being hereby reduced.

lVith circular perforations a tune sheet on being displaced sidewtyswill not allow air to pass through or the passage of air will at leastbe greatly reduced.

In order to provide for the case where the displacement of the tunesheet should exceed the usual limits I prefer making the slits in thetune sheet somewhat wider than the perforations or slits in the tracker.

By alternately arranging transverse slits 1, 1 and obliquely disposedslits 2 or 3 in a single row such combined row will replace two or threejuxtaposed rows of ordinary circular perforations. For while the slits1, 1 will only cooperate with the slits L in the tracker the slits 2will cooperate only with slits G and slits 3 with slits 5 in thetracker. In consequence thereof the combination of transversely andobliquely disposed slits allows reducing also the width of the tunesheet. A

Obviously a slit 2 or 3 in passing across a slit 4 in the tracker willlay open only too small a cross-sectional area for the passage of air sothat no actuation of the mechanism will be obtained and the same is trueof the slits 1 with reference to the slits 5 and (3 in the tracker.

It will be understood that the invention involves a great reduction inhe consump tion of paper and also of air. For in view of the reducedaxial length ofthe slits the tune sheet must be fed across the trackerat a reduced speed and the pneumatic motor driving the tune sheettherefore requires less air. In consequence thereof the instrumentrequires less physical exertion for its operation.

The term narrow used in the specification and in the claims withreference to the slits is meant to indicate that the width of each slitin the transverse direction of the tune sheet by far exceeds its lengthin the longitudinal or travelling direction of the sheet.

I wish it to be understood that I do not desire to be limited to theexact details of construction shown and described, for obviousmodifications will occur to a person skilled in the art.

I claim 1. A note sheet for auton'iatic musical in struments havingopenings therein arranged at an angle to the longitudinal axis of thesheet, said openings being elongated but of substantially the sameoperative area as the standard note opening, and adapted to cooperatewith correspondingly arranged openings of the tracker bar.

2. A note sheet for musical instruments defining note openings thelength of which is smaller and the width of which is greater than thediameter of the standard perforation of substantially the same operativearea, said openings being adapted to cooperate with openings of thetracker bar.

3. A note sheet for automatic musical instruments having relativelynarrow elongated openings arranged at various angles to the longitudinalaxis of the sheet, said openings being operative to selectivelydetermine the note to be played by cooperation with correspondinglyarranged openings of the tracker bar.

t. A note sheet for automatic musical instruments having elongatedopenings some arranged at different angles to others and adapted toselectively cooperate with corresponding angularly arranged openings ofthe tracker bar.

5. A note sheet for automatic musical instruments having elongatedopenings therein some of the openings being arranged transversely andsome obliquely to the longitudinal axis of the sheet, said openingsbeing adapted to cooperate with correspondingly arranged openings of thetracker bar.

6. A note sheet for automatic musical instruments having relativelynarrow elongated openings therein, certain of said openings beingarranged at an acute angle with relation to the longitudinal axis of thesheet and others being arranged at a different angle, the differentangular posit-ions thereof determining the playing of different notes inthe movement of the sheet over the tracker bar.

7 A note sheet for automatic musical instruments having a series ofrelatively narrow elongated openings, certain of said openings beingarranged at an acute angle and certain other openings being arranged atright angles to the longitudinal axis of the sheet.

8. A note sheet for automatic musical instruments having elongatedopenings therein arranged at various angles to the longitudinal axis ofthe note sheet, certain of said openings being superimposed uponopenings of a difi'erent angularity, said openings being adapted tocooperate with openings in the tracker bar angularly corresponding tothe openings in the note sheet.

9. In an automatic musical instrument, the combination with a trackerbar having narrow elongated openings disposed at an angle to thelongitudinal axis of the note sheet, and a note sheet havingcorrespondingly arranged and similar openings, said openings beingoperative only when those correspondingly disposed register.

10. In an automatic musical instrument, the combination of a note sheethaving elongated openings arranged at various angles with relation tothe longitudinal axis of the note sheet, and a tracker bar having anopening angularly corresponding to the openings in the note sheet.

11. In an automatic musical instrument, the combination with a trackerbar having openings therein arranged at different angles to each other,of a note sheet having correspondingly angularly related openingstherein adapted to operate selectively only when corresponding openingsof the bar and sheet cooperate.

12. In an automatic musical instrument, the combination with a trackerbar having a plurality of rows of openings transversely thereof, theopenings in each row being arranged at different angles with relation toeach other, of a note sheet having elongated openings therein arrangedat corresponding angles to those of the tracker bar openings forselectively cooperating with the bar openings.

13. In an automatic musical instrument, the combination with a trackerbar having a plurality of rows of elongated openings transverselythereof, the openings in each row being arranged at different angleswith relation to each other, of a note sheet having openings thereinarranged to move over the openings in the tracker bar but operable toeffect sounding of a note only when an opening in the note sheetcorresponds to the opening in the tracker bar.

In testimony whereof I affix my signature.

WILHELM ERNST SPAETHE.

